This is a foodie column, at least for this week. I have been eating so much awesome food, it's like Santa Monica is undergoing a revolution of foodie heaven.
Friday I was at the hottest new sandwich place in town - Mendocino Farms on Wilshire. Parking is in the back is off of 7th street, next to Douglas Reed Park; and the first thing you notice when you get out of your car is the dense, sweet, smoky scent of bacon. It's as if you've walked into a smokehouse, and you're not even in the restaurant yet!
Once inside this restaurant it has the look and feel of a sleek deli, and the long line of customers proves it. The line was out to the street at noon on Friday - which is a good sign, but not something I like in general being the impatient person I am.
The good news is the wait allows you time to read the menu and make the hard choice on what to enjoy that day. There are standards and then there are seasonal selections to choose from.
Thankfully they start taking your order when you're just inside the door, then it's off to the land of tastings for your sides. I tried the Spicy Sriacha Potato Salad, the Curried Cauliflower Couscous and the Pesto Macaroni Salad - all were winners in my book.
I had the Steak Sandwich on a soft roll, and it was perfection on a plate.
One of the things to watch out for while you're waiting, though, is the next door neighbor: Sidecar Donuts. They very deliciously are working the line that is waiting for Mendocino Farms with samples of the donuts of the day. You need to have fair warning of this, because these donuts are not your average donuts. We had Butter and Salt, Huckleberry, Bananas Foster and buttermilk donut holes. I'm a huckleberry fan so they had me at that one. Now they're not cheap. These are no 95 cent donuts, they're between $3.00 and 4.00 apiece, and when you add in the coffee, donuts for the two of us came to $20.00 with tip. But they have a bacon-crusted donut that is really amazing. So that was Friday.
Along comes Sunday and I was invited to attend a house party for Power Supply (mypowersupply.com), which is a provider of table ready meals crafted fresh by local chefs and delivered to you. In the world of diet and nutrition there are many solutions being offered. I've tried the big box of powdered drinks and the pre-packaged processed snacks - I'm not a fan. It was pretty awful actually.
Contrast that with the selection of real food, prepared in the style of the Paleo diet advocates and I was very impressed. I spoke with Stefan Niemczyk who is the local representative for Power Supply about how they use a business model of relying on many local chefs to fulfill their clients needs and wants. This luncheon was showcasing Pete's Paleo (www.petespaleo.com).
The food was all fresh, even the bacon was house-made and not full of nitrites and sugar. We started with Peruvian drum fish ceviche with purple potato, yams and salsa fresco and yucca chips followed by a golden beet puree and chive oil that was off the charts delicious, it was accented with spicy walnuts to add texture.
The main dish was a duck confit (who doesn't love duck confit!?!) salad, a kale and bacon lardon chopped salad, and roasted winter vegetables with shallots and aged balsamic including rutabaga, turnips, squash, celery root and chioggia beets.
My fellow guests were a selection of bloggers, authors and athletes. I had the great pleasure of meeting and chatting with John Durant, author of “The Paleo Manifesto” - turns out he's a really charming caveman.
I learned a lot about fitness challenges from Andy Petranek from WholeLifeChallenge.com; he used to own CrossFitLA and his new venture is here in Santa Monica and, as the website puts it, “The Whole Life Challenge is an 8-week online, community-building, habit-changing game that challenges you and your friends to create happier, healthier lives by making small, daily changes.”
In the world of private chefs and custom delivery food, there are many options, some of which I have tried. I was very impressed with Power Supply and their selection of Pete's Paleo as a showcase. I could see making arrangements to have a selection of my meals each week delivered to improve my diet and get away from the quick solutions of not bad food (most of the time) but not great food either. I don't cook, which means that I'm at the mercy for the most part of restaurants and quick serve places.
I think that if I had a regularly scheduled set of meals from these chefs that I would be more inclined to eat better when I was out in restaurants. For a family it could be a good solution to pick up on some of those busy late nights instead of ordering a pizza or just grabbing burgers. If you knew you had almost ready solutions in the refrigerator, you'd probably be more inclined to have a family dinner - which is always a good thing.
This was a great event and I want to thank Power Supply, and Pete's Paleo for expanding my world to the options of food that is the Paleo Diet.
David Pisarra is a Los Angeles Divorce and Child Custody Lawyer specializing in Father's and Men's Rights with the Santa Monica firm of Pisarra & Grist. He welcomes your questions and comments. He can be reached at dpisarra@pisarra.com or 310/664-9969.You can follow him on Twitter @davidpisarra.
